“We cannot be overheard here,” De Grost remarked. “It must be an affair of a few words only, though.”
Monsieur de Lamborne wasted no time in preliminaries. “This afternoon,” he said, “I received from my Government papers of immense importance, which I am to hand over to your Foreign Minister at eleven o’clock to-morrow morning.”
The Baron nodded.
“Well?”
De Lamborne’s thin fingers trembled as they played nervously with the ribbon of his eye-glass.
“Listen,” he continued, dropping his voice a little. “Bernadine has undertaken to send a copy of their contents to Berlin by to-morrow night’s mail.”
“How do you know that?”
The ambassador hesitated.
“We, too, have spies at work,” he remarked, grimly. “Bernadine wrote and sent a messenger with the letter to Berlin. The man’s body is drifting down the Channel, but the letter is in my pocket.”
“The letter from Bernadine?”